For the second time in as many days, Canada has sparked the ire of one of the world’s most brutal regimes.

At a UN humanitarian committee meeting on Wednesday, the North Korean representative said Canada had “insulted” the country’s “supreme authority” by, it appears, uttering the name of the late Kim Jong-il and suggesting his death marked an opportunity for the regime to undergo grand change.

“We never think of our country without his name,” envoy Kim Sook said in a statement directly squarely at Canada. “Under the wise leadership of great leader and comrade Kim Jong-il, Korean people [have] made great achievement so far and we will develop in the future, too.”

There's going to be a Wikileaks movie. James McAvoy was originally going to be Julian Assange, but becuase of a scheduling conflict he will be replaced by Inglorious Basterds' Daniel Bruhl.

And..there's going to be a Kick Ass 2. (Kick Ass was one of the best comic book movies to come along in a long time, but it remains to be seen whether it can work without Nick Cage's character, who was killed off in the first installment. However the addition of Jim Carrey as Colonel Stars is promising.)

Guillermo del Toro's Pacific Rim is creating a lot of buzz and there's a new Star Trek movie in the works too..

Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Lenczner said in his factum that Judge Hackland made several critical errors – first when he found that city council had the authority to order Ford to repay $3,150 in donations to his football foundation; then when he “conflated” provisions under the code of conduct with the Municipal Conflict of Interest Act (MCIA), and finally when he found Ford had not made an honest error in judgment.

Another Toronto lawyer – he isn’t involved in the Ford case – says in a lengthy analysis of the Hackland decision that it appears what the mayor was doing at that council meeting was first and foremost “fighting to defend his reputation. . . . He was offended, rightly or wrongly, by what he took to be political attacks on his integrity and the collateral damage on a charity that was and is dear to his heart.”

The looney left wants to replace Ford with this more dignified politician

The only downside to last night's Munk Debate at Roy Thomson Hall in Toronto had nothing to do with the arguments that were made but with the ones that were not.

The debate resolution was that the world cannot tolerate an Iran with nuclear weaponscapability and to say the dialogue was pointed and compelling would be almost redundant. From their inception, the Munk Debates have featured some of the world's most informed, articulate and experienced experts in the varied subjects presented. That list includes luminaries such as Henry Kissinger, John Bolton, Stephen Lewis, Niall Ferguson, Christopher Hitchens and Tony Blair to name a few.

Last night was no exception in that regard. The sold-out audience of 3000 included former and present political leaders, renowned writers, business magnates, distinguished academics and some of Canada's most notable personages (and I managed to sneak in too). The pair taking the pro position were the Washington Post's brilliant columnist Charles Krauthammer and Israeli Major General (ret.) Amos Yaldin opposing CNN's worldly, articulate commentator Fareed Zakaaria and John Hopkins University' School of Advanced International Studies Dean, Vali Nasr.

Krauthammer began charming the audience by recounting that he used to be a practicing psychiatrist, but switching careers to political analyst, the difference is that people he now analyzes have access to nuclear weapons.

The respective positions were quite straightforward. Krauthammer and Yaldin essentially positing that Iran is ruled by irrational, messianic terrorists who have threatened to wipe out Israel and cannot be relied upon to not use nukes in a first strike scenario should they acquire them. They also noted that the Non-Proliferation Treaty would be worthless in the region since Iran, Turkey and other Gulf states are terrified of the threat that Shiite Iran poses to their Sunni nations, and they too would acquire nukes to balance against the Mullahs' power.

Yaldin is indeed the very model of a modern major general. He is a military hero who was one of the pilots who completed the successful bombing raid deep into enemy territory that destroyed Saddam Hussein's nuclear reactor at Osirik in 1981 and now is a national security adviser.

Zakaria and Nasr proposed that Iran, despite being abhorrent, is not ruled by suicidals. They added that the Iranian threat was analogous to the Cold War between the US and Soviet Union, in that the nuclear deterrent was able to prevent a war and was a situation that everyone was able to live with.

To that latter point Krauthammer astutely countered that anyone who was an adult in America during the Cuban Missile Crisis, as he had been, would not be so cavalier about the world coming to a brink of being within hours of a nuclear war.

The cons ended up winning the debate, gaining 2% of the people who had voted the other way prior to the exchange and the big majority of the undecideds (read uninformed). Their victory came less on the merits of their arguments than beguilement by the skillful allure of Fareed Zakaria's oratory abilities. He pulled off a similar victory in the last Munk Debate I attended when, teamed with Henry Kissinger against Niall Ferguson and David Daokiu Lee, Zakaria made an appealing, emotional 'mom and apple pie' speech that America would not fall behind China as an economic power in the coming century.

Following the debate, I was having a glass of pinot grigio in the foyer while talking to a very lovely brunette when Charles Krauthammer rolled by in his electric wheelchair. I spoke with him for a bit and mentioned a significant point that when glaringly unmentioned. Zakaria had argued that America made the right right choice in not launching a preemptive war against the Soviet Union in 1945 when they were working on acquiring their nuclear arsenal.

My point was, right for whom? It most certainly wasn't right for the millions of people exterminated by Josef Stalin nor the tens of millions sentenced to a living death in the Soviet gulags. Neither was it right for the hundreds of millions of eastern Europeans whose liberty, human rights and well-being were crushed under the yolk of Soviet oppression for over forty years. It wasn't right for the Hungarians in 1956 nor the Czechoslovakians in 1968 when Russian tanks rolled into their cities to annihilate their attempt to usher in freedom. All those evils could have been avoided if America had confronted a non-nuclear Soviet Union when it had the chance. Moreover, we may be consigning tens of millions more to a worse fate if Iran gains hegemony in the Middle East.

Krauthammer, a warm, engaging man, graciously agreed they were important points. I didn't bore him with other flaws I heard in the positions of Zakaria and Nasr, such as my belief that they were being foolhardy and shortsighted to say the Iraq war was a failure. While I think it could have been avoided, democracies may eventually take hold in the Muslim middle east, despite the horrible direction the so-called Arab Spring is taking. Should that happen, then undoubtedly the removal of Saddam Hussein and the establishment of a democracy in Iraq will have been a catalyst for that change.

However the debate was only about an hour and a half and one can only make so many points in a little time. In that time, with Rudyard Griffiths doing his usual, exemplary job of moderating, the debate was a thoroughly enjoyable, stimulating conflict of ideas.

As an addendum, a poll commissioned by the Munk Debates was released yesterday that contrasted with the results from the Munk Debate audience. By a huge majority - 92% - North Americans agreed with the proposition that the world cannot tolerate Iran with nuclear weapons.

Public debates and polls may be irrelevant to the matter at this point. Security sources I have spoken to in Washington and Canada have said that US President Obama is very serious about his commitment to make sure that Iran does not gain nukes. If it gets to the point where Iran comes close to being able to assemble one, then military action from America is almost certain to follow.

The hateful core of the slow-witted left are gleeful that a judge ordered that Rob Ford be removed from office.

That laughter is going to fade very soon. Ford is appealing the ruling, which means he will likely get a stay of the order and may be able to hold on to his mayoral seat until the end of his term.

But what the Ford-haters don't seem to understand is that Ford was elected by an overwhelming margin. He received almost as many votes as all of his rivals combined. Do they really think that come the next election, those Torontonians are going to be grateful that their votes and democratic will was undermined by a miserable clique of liberal elitists?

Ford, unlike his spendthrift, tax-happy, pompous, predecessor David Miller has kept his promises, reduced spending, and sucessfully negotiated contracts with the union without giving the farm away to them. The snobbish, self-absorbed, self-congratulatory media who despised Ford's uncool image are thrilled Ford is gone. But beyond that little minority that they represent, for whom do they really speak?

There will be payback at the voting polls next election - and it won't come in the form of votes for anyone like John Tory or Josh Matlow or Adam Vaughan or Olivia Chow. If not Rob, then Doug, but a few people are in for a nasty shock, because someone from the Ford family is likely to be mayor of Toronto again.

The meaning of the striking, controversial, crystal-like structure jutting over Toronto's Bloor Street that is part of the renovated Royal Ontario Museum has been the subject of much speculation since it was built a few years ago. Yesterday I heard an explanation for its shape I hadn't heard before. Designed by architect Daniel Libeskind, it appears the edifice was built to serve the International Jewish Conspiracy.

That, at least, was the reason I was told that the noise from the loudspeakers across the street, reverberating against the crystal and amplifying the noise from the loudspeakers of pro-Israel counter-demonstrators, was drowning out pro-Hamas hysterics gathered opposite the building housing the Israeli consulate.

The Hamas supporters' demonstration was rather tame and anti-climactic.Their turnout was disappointing - almost 1300 clicktavists had committed to attend the demonstration on its facebook page, but less than a fifth of that number showed up to vent their fury. It was planned while the recent Israel-Gaza conflagration was still occurring, but since then a cease-fire has come into effect. Nonetheless, war or peace is irrelevant to the core of hateful fanatics for whom a Jewish state is an affront and its destruction is catechism.

Many of the usual suspects obsessed with eliminating the only genuine democracy in the middle east were there. Ali Mallah, the buffoonish Islamist CUPE representative, the shrill, frumpy Sociology professor Mary Jo Nadeau and Sid Lacombe, the grubby puppet of Iranian interests who acts as fuhrer of the misleadingly-named Canadian Peace Alliance, were in the forefront.

There were a few surprises as well. One of the featured speakers was a young woman who made a disgraceful name for herself earlier this month by disrupting Toronto's Remembrance Day services and insulting the memory of Canada's fallen soldiers. Ranting about Canada being a "white supremacist society," this woman was obviously too stupid to comprehend the irony of her complaining about not having free speech in Canada while screaming slanderous insults about this country into a microphone at one of the busiest intersections in the nation's most populous city. That she was honored by the vapid pro-Hamas group was hardly surprising.

A significant visual distinction between the pro and anti-Israel demonstrators that revealed much of who they are could be seen in the complete absence of Canadian flags among the Hamas supporters. The pro-Israel group held Canadian and Israeli flags together. Among the Muslim and radical leftists across the street were Palestinian, Syrian, and Turkish flags and signs proclaiming their hate, but not a single Red Maple Leaf.

The reason for that is something they made clear; because the Hamas supporters despise Canada. Referring to our country as an "occupied, racist, colonialist-settler state," among other expressions of detest, their invective towards Canada was only slightly less vitriolic than their venom directed towards Israel.

And you probably thought all the remaining Bolsheviks
had crawled back under their rocks...

Along those lines was the bloviating from Union Boss Sid Ryan of the Ontario Federation of Labour. If ever there was a personification of the need for Bill C-377, which calls for transparency in union spending, Ryan is it. Doing what he does best, which is being a self-aggrandizing blowhard, Ryan bragged about how he pushed through a 'boycott Israel' resolution while heading the Ontario branch of the Canadian Union of Public Employees. In his tenure at CUPE, Ryan's pompous foolishness did nothing but prove how ineffective his resolution was, have scorn heaped on the union, and offend the majority of public workers and others for whom Israel's destruction is the furthest thing from their minds. Claiming the "occupation" has been going on since 1947, before it even became an independent state, Ryan revealed the end of Israel's very existence is the goal he is striving to abuse his union role to further.

On the occasions I attend these types of protests, it is to observe and chronicle them. There was something about this instance that was different. This time, in the heart of Toronto, just a few blocks from the neighbourhood where I grew up, standing next to Canadian Forces veterans like Mark Vandermaas, remembering some of the brave Canadian WW2 vets whom I knew as a child, and hearing Canada and Canada's proud history being maligned by hateful acolytes of a new form of fascism, I decided to participate.

I took a Canadian flag and waved it high in the wind opposite the symbols of evil wielded by the ignominious votaries of a Death Cult. Waving our nation's flag amid a group ranging from little old ladies, former Peacekeepers, university students, average citizens and even a few of the extreme Zionists of the Jewish Defense League there to show their disdain for terrorists felt good, but I wanted to do a little more.

A barrier was put up to create a wide berth
between the terror supporters and
civilized people visiting the Museum

While Coalition Against Israeli Apartheid denizen Mary Jo Nadeau may be a low-tier academic with an unimpressive intellect, there is indeed one thing she does moderately well - screaming mindless slogans during demonstrations. Before she, Mallah and the rest of the anti-Israel mob skulked away along Bloor Street, I decided to try an experiment. The Hamas supporters have a simple, facile narrative: "we are oppressed, we are victims, they are oppressors" and that was the essence of the tripe Nadeau was screaming, but she wasn't doing a very good job of electrifying her side.

On the north side, one of the Israel supporters had been continually talking into a rival loudspeaker, reciting support for Israel and opposition to terror. He was doing a decent job of counterbalancing the din from the Hamasphiles on the south, but neither that nor Nadeau's best efforts left either side impassioned by what they heard. So I thought I'd help the bad guys get more excited about their cause.

Union Commissar Ryan bewailed Canada not "saying a word" about Israel's "disproportionate" retaliation against Hamas. So borrowing the microphone from the pro-Israel speaker, I started with: "On that side of the street, they complain that the Canadian government hasn't condemned Israel. That's because Canada supports democracy and liberty over terrorism and tyranny!" That got their notice and I continued.

"On that side of the street, they support totalitarianism and dictatorship, on this side we support democracy and freedom! On that side, they support Hamas launching indiscriminate attacks against women and children, on this side we support the right of free people to defend themselves from terror!"

Remembering that a few minutes earlier, a subdued and tired-looking Tim McCaskell from the small, lunatic fringe group of anti-capitalist Gays called "Queers Against Israeli Apartheid" had addressed the Hamas supporters, I closed with an acknowledgement of his group's self-defeating stupidity. "On that side, they support Hamas, which oppresses women, which denies free speech to Gaza and murders people for being Gay. On this side we support equal rights and human rights for everyone!"

The experiment worked. While I delivered that brief address, the Hamas-lovers were jumping up and down, shouting profanities and threats, with pained expressions of rage like rats in a Skinner Box.

I handed the microphone back to the gentleman who was speaking before me, who then continued with his recitation. Though a great deal briefer and far less eloquent than the speech delivered earlier in the week by Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird, I'd made some of the same points and had done what I wanted.

One incident that was recounted to me by an elderly woman after the demonstrations dispersed is worth mentioning. There was a young woman, a university student, holding a sign among the Hamasites that read, "I was born in Israel and I condemn Israeli Apartheid." The elderly woman asked her, "how is it that Israel is an apartheid country?" Evidently not really understanding the meaning of the word, the student replied, "Israel took land away from the Palestinians."

"But what does that have to do with apartheid?" the older woman countered. "The same land was taken away from the Jews too and was never a 'Palestinian state.' In fact Zionists were able to buy up much of the land when it was controlled by the Ottoman Empire."

To that, the younger woman said, "what's the Ottoman Empire?"

What's the Ottoman Empire? That in a nutshell describes a vast amount about the anti-Israel fanatics who gather periodically on Canadian streets. Too witless to think beyond the puerile slogans they hear and too incurious to inquire beyond the indoctrination of biased, politicized liberal arts courses, they parade like stupid lemmings to the precipice of a loathsome ideology they don't even comprehend.

Friday, November 23, 2012

It was a grey, drizzly, crappy day this Friday morning. Looking outside should make one for a moment of those hardworking Canadians, serving their fellow citizen and doing a job for the government by making sure you get your mail delivered on time.

To get that job, the mail sorters, the carriers, the truck drivers, the front line workers manning the post offices were all forced to join a union, The Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW).

If you are a postal worker who doesn't like what the union does, it doesn't matter, you had to join. If you think union politics are insidious, it doesn't matter, you had to join. If you don't want union dues deducted from every one of your paychecks, it doesn't matter, it gets taken from you and you have no say over it.

I've worked in unionized environments. For the government. the vast majority of union members are decent, hardworking people. They do their job, cash their cheques, and for the most part, their only involvement with the union is getting a free calendar from them once a year and the odd notice for a union barbecue or holiday party. Not much in return for the hundreds of dollars culled from each employee over the course of each year from their weekly salaries.

Union employees and representatives are another mater. With few exceptions, the ones intimately involved with the union are the worst, most inept employees, and are prone to pettiness and sleaziness. They focus on the union as a way of protecting their ability to be inept and sleazy in the workplace.

The union bosses, who make big salaries and don't even work in your workplace, are the worst of the lot. They run their operations like Stalinist fiefdoms. They live lavishly while pretending to be regular Joes. They travel the country and beyond with large expense accounts and little concern for how the money is spent. Because for them the cash keeps coming and coming, every week, out of the workers' dues.

Think of the history of the long and intricate involvement between unions and organized crime and that tells you much about union "ethics."

Union bosses love playing the big shot, taking money from regular working people to pay for their depraved, insidious political goals. The Canadian Union of Public Employees regularly sends its bosses on "solidarity missions" to the communist dictatorship in Cuba or to prostrate themselves at the feet of authoritarian buffoon Hugo Chavez in Venezuela. All this on the dime of union members, who are never told how much it costs.

Public service unions in Canada do not pay taxes nor do they disclose their spending.

For the guy and gal postal worker out there in the cold today, doing the hard job to let those union bosses live it up, the worst part is, they don't even get to be told by the unions how their money is spent. The union bosses want to keep it that way for a very logical reason. They know out much disgust and outrage they would face from their own membership upon seeing how their money funds the waste and malfeasance of the high-living bosses.

The current example is the all-expenses excursion CUPW is sending six "delegates" to in Brazil for a "Let's Destroy Israel" conference. In a facade of trasparency, the union is letting anyone from its membership apply to go. But the twist is that, "Priority will be given to members who have experience with issues and activities related to this trip.." In other words, their cronies who share the hateful, politicized fanaticism of the union bosses get the largesse dispensed to them. While the average postie who isn't interested in destroying Israel is left to pick up the tab.

Union members have a right to expect their dues to be used to support workplace safety, fairness and collective bargaining; not the pet Jew-hate or communist cheerleading projects of the union kings.

Bill C-377, which has passed its Second Reading and has gone to the House of Commons Finance Committee, has the union commissars in a full-blown panic. It will force unions to disclose their spending on items over $5000. The unions are apoplectic with fear of having to tell the people whose money they squander exactly how they are doing it.

The unions have become so enraged, one of their stooges, a CUPE organizer named Humberto da Silva, who makes videos for the union-financed website rabble.ca, produced a video in which he compared Prime Minister Stephen Harper to Adolf Hitler because of the introduction of the spending transparency Bill.

Transparency wasn't actually big on Hitler's to-do list. Like CUPW's bosses, making life bad for Jews was. If CUPW and some of the other union honchos want to find Hitler comparisons, they need not point all the way to the Prime Minister's office in Ottawa. The nearest mirror would do much better.

The Islamist and totalitarian leftist hatemongers and fanatics who support terrorists whose goal is the destruction of Israel are planning a huge gathering in downtown Toronto this Saturday afternoon. Though a ceasefire was agreed to in the current Israel-Gaza conflict, their hate for Israel and desire to see it annihilated has not subsided and they still plan on spewing their venom on the streets.

The mainstream media, some for laziness, others because of their shallow-minded, politically-correct cultural relativism, will portray the event in a different way than understood anyone who ever has seen the groups involved in action.

Though it will be portrayed in the pages of The Toronto Star and on CBC broadcasts as a pro-Palestine or even an "anti-war" rally, the late essayist and philosopher Christopher Hitchens has these people identified correctly; "in reality, they are straight out pro-war, but on the other side." The other side for the Islamo-fascist/totalitarian left alliance, as we have seen in Toronto in the last few weeks, both at disruptions during Remembrance Day services and in front of the Israeli consulate, is Canada's enemy the Taliban and the terror group Hamas.

The people who will be marching will not be a reflection of normal, civilized Canadian citizenry. They are hatemongers and supporters of totalitarianism. And as they say at the ballpark, you can't tell the players without a program, so here is a primer to some of the more prominent reprobates who are likely to be there:

Zafar Bangash, the Grand Poobah of the York Region Islamic Centre. Bangash is a hatemonger and racist whom, at an anti-Israel rally, called US President Obama "that black man in the White House" and later referred to him in an article as "a perfect Uncle Tom." A hypocrite as well as a hatemonger, Bangash plays footsie with so-called progressive, anti-homophobia groups while also saying that Muslim children should not be taught that homosexuality isn't a sinful lifestyle. Bangash is a paid mouthpiece for the murderous, Iranian regime, having worked with the Iranian government on a laudatory biography of its sadistic dictator, Ayatollah Khomeini.

Bangash is one of the principal leaders of anti-Israel activities in Ontario. Many of the participants at Saturday's hate rally will be bused in from the mosque he leads as well as under the direction of the Shiite organizations with which he is closely involved.

Ali Mallah, another nasty racist and hypocrite. Mallah, like his close associate Zafar Bangash, used racist terminology, calling Muslim reformer Tarek Fatah a "house Negro" while preposterously calling those who oppose his fanaticism "racists." Presenting as simple-minded, thuggish buffoon, he is actually an astute organizer and is the link between Islamist organizations and far left Trotskyite, anti-western groups. He has held or currently holds senior positions in The Canadian Arab Federation (defunded by the federal government for supporting terrorism and anti-Semitism), Palestine House, CUPE, The Canadian Peace Alliance and Alternatives International.

Mallah used his position as a CUPE vice president to suppress union criticism of the Darfur genocide as it would be harmful to the reputation of Muslims and Arabs.

Eva Bartlett is a strange woman with a neurotic demenour, originally from Canada, now residing in Gaza with her Palestinian husband. She is a member of the radical pro-Islamist Trotskyite group International Solidarity Movement. Her supporters refer to her as "the Canadian Rachel Corrie" although, unlike her supposed namesake, she has at least demonstrated the minimal level of sanity required to avoid playing chicken with an Israeli military bulldozer. Her efforts are supported by Mallah and a fanatical anti-Israel group with the deceptive name Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East. Bartlett maintains that while Israel does not have the right to defend itself, Palestinians have the right to launch terror attacks which qualify as war crimes because she deems them "resistance."

No One Is Illegal a depraved, Trotskyite group that has been in part funded by the University of Toronto's communist-controlled Ontario Public Interest Research Group. No One Is Illegal opposes any immigration restrictions and has close links with the violent Black Bloc, and shares membership with them.

Palestine House is a Palestinian advocacy organization that lost its federal funding due to its support for terrorism and anti-Semitism. It has been involved in massive immigration fraud.

OCAP - The Ontario Coalition Against Poverty is a radical, violent, anti-capitalist group funded by the Canadian Union of Public Employees. Its leader, John Clarke, has called for class warfare. The group is comprised largely of homeless and mentally ill individuals. OCAP frequently attracts unfortunates with no knowledge of the causes involved to its demonstrations and protests by promising them free food.

Queers Against Israeli Apartheid is an anarchist/Trotskyite organization of Gays who seek Israel's elimination. Many of its membership are psychologically damaged Gay Jews who are venting rejection by their conservative families by seeking destruction of the Jewish state. The group also functions as a rare social outlet for marginalized, unattractive lesbians with few other social venues. Among its members is the author of a notorious anti-Semitic Masters degree thesis produced for the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education.

Independent Jewish Voices is a group of socially maladroit anti-Israel Jews which was founded by and is largely comprised of 9-11 conspiracy theorists. Many of its members are Marxist academics insecure about being intellectual lightweights. Most of its members are, old, bitter, childless and resentful.

Sandra Ruch is the obese owner of the Canadian Gaza Boat, dubbed by bloggers as The Sea Hitler. She frequently engages in hyperbolic and hysterically over-emotional public tirades. Her behaviour suggests a lonely, insecure person desperate for attention. As a Jew who publicly denounces Israel with the most extreme, preposterous invective, she is able to get that otherwise unattainable notice from Islamist and Marxist groups for whom destruction of the Jewish state is of paramount importance while providing them with the pretense for deniability of their anti-Semitism.

Neutrei Karta is a bizarre Jewish cult of extremist anti-Israel Jews. Due to the small size of the cult,
the membership is frequently inbred, which partially accounts for their freakish appearance. They claim to be pro-Palestinian, but that is disingenuous. They also claim to be anti-oppression, but the only oppression anywhere they have ever expressed outrage about is that allegedly committed by Israel. The motivation for the cult's anti-Israel activities is a misguided belief that God has prohibited Jews from creating a state in Israel until the arrival of the Messiah. They seek Israel's destruction as a means of redressing that "error." The cult's hatred for Israel is so intense that they have embraced the murderous, Holocaust-denying President of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, with whom they share the common goal of the elimination of the Jewish state.

The cult also believes that Jews should dress like Eastern Europeans in the early 17th Century, which accounts for their clown-like costumes.

CASMO - The Canadian Organization of Shiite Muslims. The group, while denying hating Jews is overtly anti-Semitic. It has posted anti-Semitic videos by neo-Nazi leader David Duke on its website and its membership is tied to the recent case of the Hate Madrassa in Toronto which was the subject of a hate crime investigation for teaching anti-Semitism as part of its curriculum. The group is closely linked with Zafar Bangash and Ali Mallah.

Wednesday, November 21, 2012

It takes a brave hacker to declare war on the state of Israel. As Israel’s neighbors can attest, declaring war on the Jewish state doesn’t tend to produce favorable outcomes.

So it was interesting to see the hacker group Anonymous declare “war” on Israel, which probably has as much legal significance as America declaring war on “terror”. Vowing to retaliate against Israeli strikes against Gaza, Anonymous claimed to have attacked hundreds of Israeli government and private Web sites, though Israeli officials say the damage has been minor. They also published names of donors to Israel. Israeli newspapers, busy covering the conflict with Hamas, have barely mentioned the attacks.

Garneau represents a very different candidate from Trudeau, who is also from Montreal. Quieter and more studious, he is nonetheless well known across the country for being Canada’s first astronaut to fly in space. Garneau also headed the Canadian Space Agency.

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

" ...while the IDF’s social media campaign has drawn criticism from those who feel it trivializes war and its consequences, it’s unlikely to be the last of its kind. “We’re at a moment where this stuff is not only the way a lot of these communications happen, but the audience is primed for it,” said Sree Sreenivasan, a professor of social media at Columbia’s School of Journalism. “There’s no point saying they shouldn’t be doing it because no one is going to listen,” he said. "

Monday, November 19, 2012

A reader sent a photo of a sign up at the York University Student Centre

and the two students manning the desk inside

The university, with a campus in the north part of Toronto, has denied it has such an atmosphere in a petition filled with academics, many of whom have questionable reputations, but it seems integrity and honesty are not on the curriculum at Hamas York University.

Twinkie and Wonder Bread lovers in the U.S. can still head north of the border to stock up on the baked goods even with the bankruptcy of Hostess Brands Inc.

Saputo Inc. (SAP), Canada’s largest dairy processor, has the trademark and brand rights to Hostess CupCakes and Hostess Twinkies in the country and manufactures the products themselves, said Sandy Vassiadis, a spokeswoman for the company.

“It’s totally separate,” she said, in an interview from Saputo’s headquarters near Montreal. “We own the rights in Canada so what’s happening in the U.S. doesn’t affect us.”

I was walking through the crowd at last night’s anti Jewish National Fund rally (as an observer) quietly filming the crowd when I heard someone behind me make claims that I’m a racist, sexist homophobe. My first reaction was to think “oh yeah, I’m at an old-left rally- it was bound to happen. This is what they do when they disagree with someone- start throwing around unfounded hate. Using anti-oppression as a weapon is the old-left’s ultimate form of oppression…

Does your sense of self-esteem fluctuate depending on whom is your municipal councilor or mayor?

Do you feel better or worse about yourself and your ability to hold your head high depending on whether you have a socialist or a conservative being called "Your Honor" at City Hall?

If the answer is no, then you're obviously not a "progressive" Torontonian.

It's a fascinating phenomenon that only affects one type of political class I've heard it in conversations, seen it on facebook postings and the National Post's Chris Selley noted in a tweet that the Toronto Star's dunce columnist Christopher Hume is feeling personally humiliated because Rob Ford is the mayor of Toronto.

When the pompous, inept David Miller ruled Toronto for two previous terms and imposed a preposterous agenda while sending taxes skyrocketing, I don't remember a single conservative whining about how they were personally embarrassed. Have I missed something where socialist websites have been offering a discount on those online genealogy packages and a bunch of them have discovered they are related to Rob Ford though their bloodlines?

When David Miller utterly capitulated to civic employees unions after leaving the city with six weeks worth of stinking garbage piled high in the height of the summer, was anyone on the right ashamed to be a Torontonian because of him? Again, a resounding nyet.

To understand this, one has to know a little about the "progressive" mindset. They are hopelessly insecure and see their entire value as human beings being based on what others think of them. By that extension, being in a city where a boisterous fiscal conservative won the last civic election by an enormous margin over all his rivals must come as a painful personal blow. It must be so shameful for them to have to explain that to their enlightened friends who live in places like Vancouver.

They must hang their heads low when they travel and go to diner parties with friends from other locales. Sitting at tables with flowing chardonnay and Joan Baez' singing playing on the sound system to remind them of their youth, while their comrades can talk about how much progress they have made, the Toronto progressive must have to cower in shame. It must be incomprehensible for such a gathering to grasp how a modern Canadian city chose to be governed by someone who believes government shouldn't spend more than it can afford.

Clearly this sort of personal affront must have been caused by the progressives not being progressive enough. If only they had raised taxes even further, incurred more civic debt while doling out public funds to any grievance-monger capable of filling out a form and found new laws to restrict personal liberties, more people would see things their way.

Oh, the sorrow and humiliation. And the worst part is, when they create a performance art interpretive dance piece to express their dismay, it might be a little harder to get that tax-funded arts grant so that a total of 14 people in an audience can experience their plight.

Sunday, November 18, 2012

As dusk darkened the skies and the streetlights began to replace the sunshine, an unsavory group of about eighty hysterics gathered beside the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's headquarters on Front Street in Toronto to screech at and harass the benefactors of a Jewish charity.

As fashionable women in evening gowns and their dapper escorts filed into the Toronto Convention Centre for the Jewish National Fund's Negev Dinner, the contrast with the slatternly assemblage across the street could not be more stark.

This poor, exploited person is a regular sight
at protests featuring the Socialist Action group

"Two, four, six eight, Israel is a racist state!" along with screams of "you are a racist!" greeted the confused patrons of an organization that funds environmental projects in Israel.

Angry Muslims in checkered keffeyehs made up most of the spiteful horde of demonstrators, along with a few stocky lesbians, and some wrinkled crones from the group of bizarre, Jewish anti-Israel 9-11 conspiracy theorists that calls itself Independent Jewish Voices (IJV). For just a bit of extra weirdness, they had support from a handful of the wretched psychiatric hospital outpatients who make up the anti-capitalist group Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP).

Just a few days earlier, the same motley collection of anti-Israel extremists had gathered outside the Israeli Consul General's office, but tonight's demonstration made their motives abundantly clear. In Toronto, the anti-Israel crowd isn't just interested in hating Israel, they are equally motivated by hate for Jews.

How else to explain why they would try to demonize as "apartheid" the least racist state in the Middle East, the only one in that region where all citizens regardless of race and religion are able to vote, participate in government, and live side-by-side? How else to explain that they advocate for Palestinian national self-determination, and have no problem with that of any other group except the Jews, the only group whose national aspirations they characterize as "racist?"

That would happen when Hamas stops bombing Israeli civilians
FROM Gaza

Most revealing of all about their hatred and bigotry is that they no longer chose politically relevant locations, like Israeli government offices, but have now moved on to target ordinary Canadian Jews who support planting trees in the Holy Land.

While the Muslim hatred of Israel and Jews is obvious, some interesting aspects of the rationale for the non-Muslim cranks came to light. In the case of the lesbians, these types of demonstrations' apparent primary purpose is to provide a social channel for them. There are many attractive, charming, engaging lesbians. The ones in the anti-Israel groups are not they. These are tremendously ugly, unpleasant women, and given that lesbians comprise a small minority of the population, there are few venues for these bottom-rung lesbians to socialize with others like them. Radical organizations that condemn "lookism" and engage in anti-western, anti-Israel activities are among the few such opportunities they have.

Hate Thesis author with OCAP types

Among the lesbians at tonight's demonstration was the notorious Jenny Peto, whose anti-Semitic Master's thesis was so inept, shrill and hateful, it embarrassed the University of Toronto to the point of calling their academic standards into question. Her presence and that of the psychologically damaged IJV members showed the familiar and saddening tactic of how some pathetic, desperate Jews are exploited as a front for anti-Semitism. Another was a very odd woman; a Canadian Union of Public Employees activist who is a stalwart of these events, and previously had stalked Sun TV host Michael Coren as he asked questions at a pro-Omar Khadr demonstration.

Other participants who are fixtures at these events were the fanatic, frumpy Wilfred Laurier Sociology Assistant Professor, Mary Jo Nadeau and clownish OCAP spokesman Marque Brill.

One atypical happening that occurred during the evening was that a lone, short young man came into the crowd to angrily confront them. He did not seem to have anything to do with the Jewish National Fund event being harassed, but was clearly enraged and came over to speak his piece. He was immediately surrounded by the radicals who got into his face and exchanged shoves with him before he was ejected from the area by police.

This single supporter of Israel was so infuriated he made some heated remarks, but still one has to admire the courage of this solitary soul who took on the hostile group like a young Jewish Joe Peschi.

As fury rages across the street, these cops sensibly
flirt with a pair of attractive women who found the
protesters laughable

What is gratifying about the events that unfolded tonight was to observe how counterproductive it was for the message the fanatics were trying to convey. This is a completely typical byproduct of such hateful gatherings. Standing on the street, passersby who had nothing to do with the gathering first voiced confusion as to what it was all about. Arabic-accented chants of "From Turtle Island to Palestine, occupation is a crime!" did nothing to help clarify the cause of their fury.

Hate-filled screams from the neurotic, angry old women of Independent Jewish Voices, the ferocious, butch lesbians who are denizens of politicized Ontario Institute for Studies in Education programs and swarthy, veiled and keffiyeh covered Muslims who looked like they had been brought in by Central Casting to try out for a movie as terrorist extras didn't endear them to the general public. "F**king idiots" was a fairly typical response and this was from people who cared nothing about either side in the Israel-Palestinian conflict.

The cretinous look of the protesters and their vicious invective was enough to self-inflict damage to their cause. One other episode worth noting happened when a spiteful-looking woman, about 60, wrinkled face and wearing jeans and an anorak - a regular I recognized from these protests - one of The Independent Jewish Voices type, came over to the side of the street where the Convention Centre stands. Through the floor-to-ceiling windows, one could see the people headed to the Negev dinner filing on to an escalator. There were some very beautiful women among them and everyone attending the JNF dinner was dressed rather elegantly.

This bitter woman from the protest group walked back and forth a bit, silently watching the people going to a pleasant evening with delicious food. Her loathing and envy were palpable as she saw the hated Zionists having a fine time while she was left on the outside. What probably hurt her the most as she rejoined her cronies across the street was the realization that standing out there in the cold, all she and her cohorts were doing was reaffirming their own hate to each other while persuading no one else.

Near the onset of the protest, Greg of GenuineWitty encountered, for the first time ever he said, Jenny Peto, the author of an anti-Semitic thesis condemned in Ontario`s Legislature by Minister of Citizenship Eric Hoskins, among other politicians and notable academics, like Irving Abella and Werner Cohn.

In their encounter, she employs the same rigid logic she used in her fatuous essay

UPDATE: Greg of GenuiteWitty shot this video of the pro-Israel protester who confronted the pro-Hamas throng